Kicker
by tracelynn
Summary: A story exploring the relationship of the Male Morphling and his lover. Based on songs by Zella Day. Written for Caesar's Palace One Hit Wonder Challenge.
1. East of Eden

The vial shimmers in the light as it pours through the cloudy, warped glass of the house's windows. Dirk inspects it with a practiced eye. Five years out of the Games, and already he is a self proclaimed expert on all things drug related. His primary habit, however, is morphling. Dirk cannot help but examine the silvery clear liquid as it glimmers in the sunlight. It seems of fair quality. Well, at least of fair quality for dirty morphling. This isn't the pure, strong stuff in the Capitol. It's weak, diluted, a small stolen syringe of the thing watered down to fill dozens of vials. Still, it gets you high. And that's all Dirk Tautson and Ibiza Tran care about at the moment.

Dirk removes two needles from their worn mahogany case, watches as their fine points glitter and glimmer and shine and cascade all before his eyes. Just the sight of the needles puts him in a mental euphoria, a mental state preparing for the pricks of the needles, for the flood of silvery clear liquid. Ibiza squeezes his hand as he pumps the cloudy liquid into the syringes. She smiles when he's done, and there are two full syringes lying on the table before them.

"Be my man and show me what it feels like," Ibiza murmurs into Dirk's ear. "Chase my demons away, Dirk. Chase them away."

Dirk kisses her softly, and then he breathes in the salty ocean scent of her russet hair as he positions the needle above her front arm. He lightly presses his lips against her ear, whispering.

"This is what it feels like," Dirk replies, his voice sensual and deep and everything Ibiza has ever felt. Then he presses down the plunger, the needle pierces her suntanned forearm, and euphoria arrives.

Dirk quickly applies his own dose, and then they are a tangle on the cold wooden floor. Colors and shapes explode around them as they kiss and kiss and kiss and kiss until they can't do anything else, until they've never done anything else. Escaping. Escaping. Escaping. Escaping. Escaping. That's what Greason harshly calls activities like these. Dirk is avoiding his problems. But he doesn't listen to the old man. Dirk only focuses on his lover's soft, supple lips, her russet hair, her tanned skin, her glowing sea foam green eyes that bore into his soul. He is higher than he's been in weeks, and not because the morphling's stronger; in fact, it's weaker than normal. It is Ibiza's first time, after all. No, what makes him higher than high is this girl pressed beneath him, this girl who appeared to be a monster after she slaughtered 7 other children in the 61st Hunger Games. This girl's hard exterior is stripped away when they are alone like this, revealing a tormented, broken girl, not a fierce, warrior-like woman. Dirk loves this monster. And Ibiza loves him back.

After three hours or so, they finally come down. Their clothes are still on, but their lips are sore and red, and their bodies ache from rolling around on the hard wooden floorboards. Dirk and Ibiza lie next to each other, staring up at the white ceiling as dust motes float around above them. They do not speak. They do not breathe. They live, and they love. And that it is enough for the both of them.

"That was amazing," Ibiza grunts after some time. "Amazing."

"I love you, Ibby," Dirk whispers.

"I love you, Dirk."

"When do you have to leave, Ibby?"

"Tomorrow," Ibiza groans. "I...I don't want to leave you. Dorsal and Mags are sympathetic, but Bex is disgusted, and Flotsam is bothered. They want me home, Dirk. Baby, I don't wanna leave. Could you come to 4?"

"I love you, Ibby," Dirk murmurs.

"Is that a yes, baby?" Ibiza asks, curling up in his arms.

"I love you, Ibby," Dirk rasps. Ibiza doesn't understand, not really. But then again, no one really does understand Dirk Tautson, not even his lover.

"And I love you, Dirk Tautson. I'll...I'll see you in the Capitol."

"I love you, Ibby," Dirk growls from the floor as Ibiza stands. She just nods, smiling.

 _What the hell have I gotten myself into, loving this man?_ Ibiza thinks to herself as she staggers out of his house. The rusty sign proclaiming the area to be District 6's Victor's Village sprouts over the path leaving behind the houses that Ibiza trudges on. She spots Indigo watering her lilies. Mercedes and Greason are nowhere to be found. Ibiza hesitantly leaves behind the Village, walking to the center of town. A car waits there, a crotchety and aging Bex Martin sitting in the backseat. Ibiza boards and they drive off.

"What did you do?" Bex hisses once they're well on their way back home to District 4.

"He showed me what it felt like," Ibiza whispers. Bex spots the needle mark on Ibiza's left arm, taking in her half dazed expression.

"Silly, silly girl," Bex chuckles. "I'll be sure to bring my flowers to your funeral after you overdose with your so called 'lover', Tran." Bex had the inclination to refer to Ibiza as Tran, like the woman had in the training academy. Ibiza bites her tongue and just pulls her sleeves lower over her arms to cover up the needle bite. She tries to forget Dirk Tautson, but of course it will never work. Love does strange things to people.

And this love will bring Ibiza Tran down.

* * *

 **A/N: Hey everyone! This is a fic for Caesar's Palace One Hit Wonder Challenge! There's going to be 6-12 chapters, each based on a song from Zella Day. This chapter was based on the song East of Eden. I hope you liked Ibiza and Dirk, and I hope you decide to stick around! :)**

 **P.S. Inter-District travel is prohibited, and the reason Ibiza is in District 6 will be made clearer in later chapters.**

 **Until next time,**

 **Tracee**


	2. 1965

Ages pass. Years fly by in her mind's eye as she huddles in a heap of blankets. Her arms beg for the prick of a needle, and her lips beg for the soft, caring touch of Dirk's chapped lips. She could never imagine that missing him could be this bad. She isn't sure if it's the withdrawal, the already crystallizing addiction, that's making her feel this way, or if it's true love. Ibiza chuckles to herself. True love doesn't exist. It's just her luck that she's fallen head over heels for a morphling addict that will probably overdose in a few weeks anyway. With the thought of truly losing Dirk stuck in her mind, Ibiza crawls deeper under her mound of quilts and wishes the memories away, but it's already much too late.

 _She watches with remorse as the skittish boy from 6 scurries out into the open square of the medieval village. He lowers himself into the well, and disappears from sight. A minute later, the other three contenders, the two Careers from 4 and the scrawny 13 year old female from 3, all arrive. The female from 4 guts the girl from 3, and then they search for Dirk relentlessly._

 _Ibiza holds her breath. Her hands fumble with the turquoise smock that hangs limply across her muscled body. Only age 14, and she's already been chosen to be the female volunteer from District 4 for the 61st Annual Hunger Games. It's the 57th now. She remains still and waits with bated breath. A male from 6, who got a 5, faced with a duo of trained Careers from her District? There's no way 4 will not have a new Victor this year._

 _Finally the male peers over the edge of the well. Suddenly Dirk pops up. He's cut the bucket from the rope that is lowered into the well to retrieve water normally. He deftly wraps a noose around the Career's neck, and then lets go. The boy scrabbles with the rope, but it's tight. The female watches in horror as her District partner slowly turns blue, choking to death._

 _The cannon shot is loud, and Dirk glowers at the female. The girl next to Ibiza, 15 year old Anemonia, holds her breath. That girl, Coralia, is Anemonia's older sister. Coralia raises her long sword and rushes at Dirk._

 _Dirk scrambles out of the way at the last moment, and Coralia can't turn away in time. She collides with the side of the well and falls onto her backside. She screams as Dirk uses a shard of rock to bash her head in. Then Dirk is left weeping pitifully next to a headless 13 year old girl, a girl with a now concave skill, a hung boy, and a bloody rock that falls from his hands with a clatter._

 _Anemonia wails in terror. Anemonia quits the Academy the following day. She is swiftly replaced by another eager 15 year old girl. Ibiza just shivers as she walks home from the square that night. Fear leaks into her veins, chilling her body. Even sunbathing the next day away cannot warm the cold pit in her stomach._

 _Ibiza Tran is terrified for her life. And yet, she will volunteer four years later because that is what she must do. She will volunteer because she is a Career, and Careers sacrifice themselves so weaklings cannot be forced to die unfairly. Ibiza pretends that her job is noble, that her job is necessary, that her job is morally right, while she hacks apart seven lives and watches many more fade before her eyes. Then Ibiza Tran is left alone in her arena, and it takes every bit of her self control not to hurl the bloodied rock in her hand at the oncoming hovercraft._

When Ibiza rouses herself out of the reverie, she hasn't eaten in a day and a half. Her stomach growls for food, but she's become accustomed to starvation. Finally, three hours later, a deflated looking Dorsal enters the house. He coaxes food and water down her throat and comforts her.

"How long have I been in here?" Ibiza rasps after she's done eating her chicken noodle soup.

"Five days," Dorsal says in reply. "Why? Did it feel longer?"

 _You have no idea._

* * *

 _She first meets him on his Victory Tour. He's weak and shaky and his words are slurred and hurried. Their public appearance instructor, Ms. Warell, tells them to do exactly the opposite of the scrawny 16 year old. Ibiza admits that he is a terrible public speaker, and his eyes are alight with a crazed glint. But that can be ignored, of course. From her experiences with 4's 6 current Victors during her training, Ibiza knows that even the kindest, most put together Victors have their insane moments, their broken moments. So she doesn't think that the fear he sees in this boy's every motion is weakness. No, she almost admires it. He's faced fear and survived to tell about it. It...inspires her._

 _She's 15 now, barely so, but still. 15 years old. The same age as the new volunteer for the 60th, Kareen, who has the face of a toad and the arm muscles of 2's strongest quarriers. She feels jealous of the girl's strength, but not her looks. Ibiza is admittedly rather beautiful, or so she's been told by countless suitors. She's never been in a romantic relationship before, however. She doesn't want to start anything before she heads off to the arena. If she doesn't make it back, she doesn't want to leave a trail of broken hearts behind. Her family's grief will be enough. Maybe her reasoning for no romance is also the reason she has absolutely no friends. Or maybe it's just her. Ibiza isn't the most friendly person._

 _The 7 prospective recruits for the Games, the probable volunteers for the 58th thru 64th Games, line up with the male recruits at District 4's banquet. The males go first, shaking Dirk's hand. Most shake his hand hard, rough, glaring at him whilst their mouths fold into magnificent smiles. Dirk almost cowers before these men. He has no experience with Careers, after all, besides the ones her outwitted in his Games. He doesn't realize that being a Career isn't just about being able to cleave someone's skull open; it's about speaking well and looking good to attract sponsors. It's about being honorable and about being polite and about being respectful. Being a Career is so much more than just killing, really. No one really understands that too well._

 _Soon Ibiza is shaking Dirk's hands. His hands are cold, clammy, repulsive. She shakes his hand tightly and smiles genuinely._

 _"You're the only one who's actually smiled right at me so far tonight," Dirk whispers in her ear before stepping away. She grins shyly before stepping away for the 62nd volunteer can shake Dirk's hand. She bites her lip as she watches the boy walk away. He is not attractive. His skin is pale, almost translucent, and his shaggy black hair is scraggly. His face structure is almost repulsive, and his dark blue eyes glitter creepily from his sockets. He is not strong. She cannot even see a hint of a bicep or any other muscles for that matter on his body. He's just skinny as a rail, and tall, too. He is smart, however, cunning, sly. And this boy is real. He is not like everyone she knows, backstabbing each other so they can go into an arena to backstab some more and probably get killed for the sport of it. No, this boy is_ real. _These are no simple Games to him. He played with desperation, not effortless confidence or snide rudeness, like so many other Careers. This boy was sentenced to death several weeks ago. Through pure desperation, he managed to survive. Ibiza is impressed by this boy._

 _She gives him one last parting look._

 _They will not see each other again until Ibiza's own Victory Tour._

* * *

"We've last through so much. We've lasted through his overdoses, we've last through hate and suspicion and tabloid exploitation, through Snow's threats...we're made to last, Mags. Made to last," Ibiza murmurs as she sits on the beach. She has a bikini on, but she also has towels wrapped around her entire body. Aging Mags sits on the beach next to her, her gray white hair billowing around her bony face.

"I know that you love him," Mags mutters. "But sometimes loving someone means letting them go."

"I can't let him go. It's been two months since I last saw him, and there hasn't been a minute where he hasn't crossed my mind. Nothing...nothing works."

"Drugs do," Mags whispers. "Of course, I don't know that from personal experience. Drugs work for you, don't they, Tran?" Ibiza recoils. What is Mags doing, talking to her like this?! "Drugs seem harmless. They seem _fun_ , now, don't they? Honey, this man will kill you with his addictions one day, if not soon. Do you want to die after surviving through so much, after fighting for so long?"

"Yes," Ibiza hisses. "I want to die."

Mags just sighs and pats Ibiza on the back.

"Tran, once you're mind's right, come to my house and we'll talk. Oh, and by the way, the Games Comissioner just called. You and Dorsal will be the Mentors for this 64th Hunger Games, darling. Have fun." Mags stands and leaves Ibiza sitting on the beach.

Ibiza doesn't move until Mags returns around midnight and drags the girl back into her house.

* * *

 **A/N: Here's the second chapter, based on the song 1965! I hope you enjoyed the development of Ibiza's character! :)**

 **Until Next Time,**

 **Tracee**


	3. Hypnotic

_Fingertips brush fingertips as the two walk down the narrow hallway together towards the Mentor's Center, a little offshoot on the side of the Control Center, where the Gamemakers work. Two pairs of eyes, one muddy brown, the other sea glass green, meet. Shocks and trembles and shivers roam around both bodies as they discreetly touch one another. A swipe of his thumb against the heel of her hand, the tap of her pointer finger on his knee. Invisible, meaningless touches to the outsider. In reality, this is their replacement for kisses and for sweet words. Both pinkies reach out at once to touch the other, and they wrap around each other. His breathing becomes heavy, and her heart thumps wildly._

 _They step into the Control Center and then they break apart._

 _He takes his seat with Indigo, and they wait for their two short, willowy tributes to rise up. In fact, the boy is a morphling addict. Dirk can sympathize with his violent withdrawal symptoms. But hey, he's gone for a week without it. It's improvement, really. It's all her doing, but he doesn't divulge that fact to himself._

 _She crouches between Bex and Flotsam, eyes narrowed as the tributes rise up from their plates. It's ironic, really, that the 6 boy and the 4 girl are next to each other. Both tributes this year are capable. The girl got a 9, the boy a 10. They should do fine. It's only Ibiza's first year, so she's not really a Mentor yet. But she watches and learns the delicate craft with open eyes and ears._

 _The gong rings, and the pair from 2 pumps their legs to reach the front of the rush for supplies. The girl, Enobaria, sweeps up a sword and beheads her District partner with one quick sweep of her blade. Two stations down, Brutus yells while Kyla smirks silently to herself. Flotsam and Bex meet eyes worriedly. Meanwhile, several of the other Victors are celebrating quietly. Chaff, Haymitch, and Brandy have cracked open a bottle of beer and are discreetly pouring it under the table into little plastic cups. Fox and Porter share excited looks; their boy this year's a good one. And Dirk and Indigo high five. That makes Ibiza smirk despite the situation._

 _Then the female tribute, Bex and Ibiza's charge, is beheaded by Enobaria along with the boy from 6. She has a full pack, and she dashes away from the bloodbath, leaving three corpses in her wake. The pair from 1 and the boy from 4 stand there, shocked, and only manage to make 6 more kills before the initial fight dissipates._

 _"You can go for now," Bex hisses, eyeballing a deadly glare at Kyla at the 2 station. Brutus has already left, snapping his swivel chair's arms before storming out. Mascara and Zion share terrified looks, Flotsam grips the arms of his own chair tightly, Bex and Ibiza pack up along with 7 others, and Kyla just keeps laughing quietly to herself._

 _Bex jogs off, all in a tizzy, her aging joints creaking as she goes to deliver some paperwork to the dead girl's prospective sponsors. Dirk and Ibiza find themselves alone in the break room; the remaining 15 Mentors are locked on the screens, and the other Mentors who've lost tributes are either doing paperwork back at their hotels or going out for a drink. Dirk usually goes out for a drink, or more often a hit of morphling. But the way Ibiza looks at him gets him off more than a glittering needle filled with morphling ever could._

 _No more soft touches. Their lips dance across one another's, drowning out everything else._

 _Ibiza feels guilty that she's happy that the poor girl died in the bloodbath. If Enobaria hadn't sent the girl's head rolling from her shoulders, she would have never kissed this man. She would have never felt his hands creeping up her stomach, touching her softly as they kiss hard._

 _Later on down the road, she will wish that that girl had survived, just so she would have never gotten so caught up in Dirk Tautson._

* * *

"Tran!"

"Tran!"

"TRAN!"

Ibiza shoots into a sitting position. The sweaty sheets lay in twisted mounds around her body, and she begins to sob quietly.

"Dirk, still?" Ibiza meets the eyes of Bex, who glowers down at her.

"How did you know?" Ibiza asks sleepily.

"You were talking in your sleep about him," Bex mutters tiredly. "You were screaming it a bit, actually, deary. Get a hold on that, Tran."

Bex walks off, and Ibiza just growls to herself. She relocates to one of the other rooms, and then burrows under the new set of sheets and covers.

By dawn, the sheets are soiled with sweat once again, and now its Flotsam standing disapprovingly over her as she gasps for breath.

 _If only I could feel his pinky wrapped around mine. If only...if only he was here with me._

* * *

 **A/N: This one's a little shorter, but I hoped you enjoyed it! I'm really liking these flashbacks and the exploration of Ibiza, and I hope you are too! :) Review if you can, please! It really does help. :D**

 **P.S. This one was based off of the song Hypnotic.**

 **Until Next Time,**

 **Tracee**


	4. Mustang Kids

Eleven months, two weeks, and five days. That is how long she has gone without morphling.

More importantly, that's how long she's gone without Dirk Tautson.

It's literal torture. More often than not, the front door and the windows of her home are locked by a disapproving Bex or a glowering Flotsam. Sometimes, when Syren is drunk or Dorsal is feeling especially kind, they'll unlock one of her windows or put their foot in the back door and let her out. On those days, she runs as fast and as far as she can. She must escape that place.

Her body aches, but not for morphling. If anything, her momentary dependency is fading. No one consumes that stuff in 4. It practically is non existent in the Fishing District. She doesn't miss the needles for their bite. She misses them because Dirk's hands are always wrapped around them. She doesn't miss the euphoric rush of the morphling for their ability to block everything out, although sometimes she craves it when she's especially lost. She misses it because along with that rush is an even bigger one, with his hands on her hips and his lips against hers.

 _How did it ever get so out of control?_ she wonders to herself. _How did it get so bad that they have to lock me inside my house?!_

She begrudgingly admits that it got that bad long ago. Memories resurface as she steps onto the stage along with Dorsal, but she suppresses them. It is time to see their volunteers, the ones that they will fight for this year. A banner flaps above the stage, glittering and declaring that this is the Reapings for the 64th Hunger Games. As if the worried faces in the pens need any reminding. Nowadays, sometimes the Careers in 4 duck out and a random weakling is left in their place. District 4 must now worry once again.

Ibiza plasters on a false smile and a warm aura as volunteers Barnaclea and Waydeson clamber onto the stage. Their names are longer than normal, mouthfuls really. Ibiza already knows neither of them will be coming home. It's a gut instinct that shakes her down to her core. These two teenagers will be dead in a matter of weeks.

And Ibiza guiltily hopes that this Barnaclea dies early on so she and Dirk can be alone again, like they were on the fateful night of the 62nd Hunger Games. The memories swallow her before they even make it on the train. Stupid sentimental mind.

* * *

 _She stares Ibiza down in that signature way that only Bex Martin can. Eyebrows half furled, mouth set in a quivering, flat line, eyes glistening with something Ibiza cannot describe. Ibiza doesn't like this look. No one from the Training Center in District 4 likes this look. This look usually leads to beatings and cold meals of thick, more-gelatinous-than-usual porridge for half a month._

 _"Why didn't you show up yesterday, Tran?" Bex barks. "Surely, Oysteria was dead, but still. You need to learn."_

 _"I was...enjoying myself?"_

 _Her thoughts flash to the night before. In one of the two Victor's suites on the District 6 floor. Clothes tossed to the side, they stood before one another, bare and raw and real, and lips met lips and bodies clashed and hearts melded and euphoric grins lasted forever._

 _"With Dirk Tautson?" Bex asks quizzically. "You know he's an addict, right? And disgusting outlier scum that probably doesn't even deserve to look upon your face?"_

 _"When the hell did someone give you a license to be so goddamn righteous!?" Ibiza shrieks. The words are being pushed from between her lips before she can even think about them. Bex looks upon her, horrified and quickly becoming enraged, and Ibiza's tittering mouth continues on its rampage. "He's a person too! You can't hold a frickin' grudge because he killed Anemonia and Salt in his Games! I killed the boy from 6 in my Games. Do they scream about us being useless, inferior slime because we killed their District's tributes in our own Games to save our hides? NO!"_

 _Bex just stares at her, a little impressed by her surge of emotion. Bex hides that fact however, and instead glowers after gathering her wits._

 _"Go to bed."_

 _"I'm not a child."_

 _"Go to bed."_

 _"I can-"_

 _"GO. TO. BED. IBIZA."_

 _Ibiza complies, snickering all the way, though. Bex called her Ibiza. That counts for something, right?_

* * *

She blinks tiredly when Dorsal taps her shoulder.

"Yeah?" she grunts, rubbing her eyes.

"You spaced out. We're getting on the train," Dorsal replies, trying to coax a smile onto her face, onto his face. He manages a flicker of a grin. Ibiza's face doesn't move, although her heart beats rapidly as they board the train.

Red velvet and silver and mahogany and gold and perfection and memories and tears and trying to look strong for the curious tributes and trying to suppress the memories of eating dinner with Sunfish across from Mags and Flotsam. She manages to struggle through her dinner of dry sweet and sour pork and other delicacies that taste off in her soured mouth. Barnaclea and Waydeson are perfectly mannered, as they should be. She can't pick apart a reason to hate her charge, Barnaclea. Dorsal and Waydeson really connect, but Barnaclea keeps pushing Ibiza for answers to her questions while Ibiza just tries to stay in reality, in the current time. Ibiza manages to mutter out some coherent answers that satisfy Barnaclea for the time being. Then Ibiza is off like a shot, finding the room most unlike hers from the 61st Games before she falls asleep. Memories are her only dreams now. Imagination has been ripped from her mind through her trauma. The scar tissue left behind only manages to transmit memories into her head as she slumbers. She doesn't know if that's a good or bad thing.

* * *

 _"Are you really...serious about this?"_

 _"Of course, Ibby."_

 _"I'm just...it's...I...I can't..."_

 _"Who lectured you, darling? Who lectured you about my inadequacy?"_

 _"Bex, Flotsam, even Syren, who decided to come along for the 'fun'. They said..."_

 _"That I'm an addict and all. Well, good news for you, I haven't dosed in like two weeks."_

 _"Great! I was just hearing all of this stuff and I just didn't wanna make a bad decision by...by..."_

 _"Being mine?"_

 _"Yes. Will you...date me?"_

 _"Of course. Though long distance is a rather turbulent experience."_

 _Ibiza chuckles. This is the man she falls for, the clear minded, sharp, witty, sound man without any morphling sludge dripping through his veins. The man she meets from then on is a broken, dead man, not at all like this beautiful virtue of a person that she fell for. But it's already too late. She hopes against hope that they'll pull through, that he'll return to her._

 _She knows it's futile, but she doesn't care. Ibiza Tran doesn't just give her heart up to people like him. She...she has to prove to herself that she made the right choice._

 _She knows she made the wrong choice. She's just grabbing at anything she can possibly reach._

 _Because Ibiza Tran is a flawless girl. She doesn't have big imperfections. She especially doesn't have imperfections like this Dirk Tautson._

* * *

 **A/N: This one was based off of the song Mustang Kids. I hoped you enjoyed it, and please review to tell me how I'm doing! :D**

 **Until Next Time,**

 **Tracee**


	5. High

Her hands shake as she walks off of the train, trying to put on a smile as she and Flotsam walk off of the platform with Barnaclea and Waydeson strutting forward proudly in front of them. The cameras pop with bursts of bright white flash, and the undulating, iridescent sea of Capitolites shimmers before the two shell shocked Four tributes. Ibiza smiles as Barnaclea slowly tilts her head back farther and farther to see how far the gleaming skyscrapers reach upwards, her mouth agape. The Capitol still amazes her every time she comes here. It might just be a pretty mask over an ugly, demented place, but everyone loves to admire attractive people even if their personalities and reputations are toxic.

The path to the Tribute Center is cleared, but excitable, adoring Capitolites crowd around the edges, waving and shouting and blowing kisses. Waydeson flashes flirtatious smiles and Barnaclea's head keeps swiveling around like it's on loose, she can barely walk forward since she's looking everywhere except in front of her. Soon enough they're at the doors, and Flotsam and Waydeson march in together and melt down a hallway. Barnaclea pauses outside the doors, marveling at the brave new world around her. Ibiza waits at the door, holding it open, waiting for her charge to follow, smiling softly. Maybe this won't be so bad.

"Come on, Barnaclea," Ibiza murmurs. "Once you win, you can look at the skyline forever."

Barnaclea just stands there, staring, and Ibiza tugs her inside.

"I think I'm in love," she mutters, sighing, and Ibiza chews her lip, her insides suddenly turning cold.

* * *

 _The buzz of the summer heat emanates from the Victor's Village of District Six. She couldn't resist. When the strange Dirk boy she met what feels like all those years ago invites her back to the Village after the ball in Six's square, just outside the Justice Building, she follows. She's hungry for something more than the empty eyes and handshakes and congratulations, and Dirk is a hormonal nineteen year old boy enamored with the newest Victor._

 _Indigo and Greason are already sound asleep, and Mercedes is still out drinking, when they get back to the Village. Ibiza's clueless to what is happening as his fingers discreetly brush against her thigh and as he strips off his shirt, revealing a pasty, leanly muscled abdomen, blaming the heat as the cause for ridding himself of his shirt. Ibiza's eyes dance across his sweaty chest as they walk through the sweltering garden pathways carved on the outer edge of Six's Victor Village, courtesy of Greason's building talent and Indigo's landscaping one. He takes her hand and she does not object, not even for a moment._

 _"Have you ever wondered what it's like to be one with someone?" Dirk muses, staring at the stars._

 _"Not really. I never had time for that," Ibiza mutters, staring at the glossy black flats on her feet, shimmering under the path's lights._

 _"You have time now." Suddenly Dirk is looking Ibiza in the eyes, pulling her close to his face. She jerks back a little bit, shocked, but then she lets him hold her. His eyes are sharp and bright, not yet diluted by Morphling. They will be in a matter of weeks, when he tastes a vial from Mercedes' stash after finding out that his mother has been killed under mysterious circumstances, under the direction of Snow. A delayed reaction to his rebellion in the Games. Snow always loves to toy with his victims, making them feel safe and secure and comfortable over terrified right from the start. Those types of prey are always the easiest to take down, the ones who have been lulled into a false sense of security, the ones who think their world is as good as it'll ever be._

 _"Dirk..."_

 _"Kiss me."_

 _"Why?"_

 _"Because we're high."_

 _"Did you drug me?!"_

 _"No, not a drug high. I'm high off of you. Everything's a paradise with you right now. I need you, Ibiza."_

 _"Dirk, this is sort of fast-"_

 _"It's just a kiss, Ibiza."_

 _She can't sway him, and she can't sway herself. While her instincts tell her to run her heart is pounding out of her chest, trying to leap out of her throat, and the primitive parts of her mind are pumping her full of heady chemicals that make her blood broil and run wild, and she wants to kiss him even more than she did before. She doesn't know if it's the summer night or him or her or nothing at all, but she presses her lips against his for a short moment._

 _Nothing happens for a moment, until Dirk instinctively pulls her closer. She is mashed up against his chest as they kiss, and then he's pushing her to the ground on the path, and the next moments are secrets hidden between the two of them._

 _On the blazing hot stone of the path, Ibiza stares at the night sky, shaking. Dirk stares at the sky with glazed over eyes and a lazy smile, but she gathers her clothes around her and pulls them on. Dirk turns over and looks at her, confused and worried._

 _"Where are you-" Ibiza stands up without a word and dashes off. Dirk stumbles to his feet and stands there, hands on his hips, and he sighs._

* * *

Ibiza can't stop now that he's back in her mind. His hands, his hair, his smell, his laugh, his needles, his pain, her pain, their pain. Barnaclea's in one of the remake rooms with her prep team, getting waxed and scrubbed and brushed and enhanced. She can hear the girl's light chime laugh echoing from the room, followed by the booming laugh of one of her prep team's members. Ibiza ignores it, putting her head in her hands.

"Ib...Ibby?"

Ibiza looks up slowly sighing. Who wants her attention now? She swears, if it is that damn Kyla Burks-

"Dirk? DIRK!"

* * *

 **A/N: Oh gersh I have not updated in forever! This is a little short, but I wanted to get a little something out on this story!**

 **Hope you liked the further exploration of Ibiza and Dirk's relationship! Please review if you can :D**

 **Until Next Time,**

 **Tracee**


	6. Shadow Preachers

When Ibiza was a young girl, before her beauty was exploited by President Snow, her mother would cut her hair the first Saturday of every other month. She would sit before the mirror, watching with interest as her mother's spindly fingers pried back sections of loose, flowy hair, sleek and cascading across the woman's sun wrinkled skin. Her chops were always even and smooth as the silvery scissors made a little grating noise as they sliced through the strip of hair. A circle would form around her dangling feet, and when she was done her mother would swoop away quietly, and she would sit on the stool alone, her feet dangling, her muscles aching.

When Ibiza was a young girl, before her innocence was tattered like an old dress, her father would take her to the beach the night before her birthday every single year. They'd camp on the water's edge with nothing more than a flimsy plastic tent, a picnic basket with a scant offering of nourishment, and a couple of tiny fairy-like wooden dolls that her father hand whittled for her as early birthday presents each year. As the sun set, they would crawl out onto the beach and build a little sandcastle, and play with it and the dolls until the tide crept up too far and swallowed it back to its saturnine depths. Still they played, until the ocean and the sky became inky black, and Ibiza was too scared to stay out any longer. Then they moved their tent up the beach, and her father lit a lantern or a campfire, and they'd fall asleep, Ibiza wrapped tight in her father's thickly muscled arms, dreaming of tomorrow's bounties.

When Ibiza was a young girl, before her mind was torn to pieces like an angry love letter, scattered about the floor, her brother would teach her things. She wasn't old enough to go to school yet, but by the time she would be old enough, she'd be going to the Academy, just like him. He'd picked up some things from his friends who went to day school and had never stepped foot in the Academy, however. He taught her arithmetic and science and history and literature and survival skills in the brief moments between play and sleep. The intellect helped her outplay all of her enemies in the Academy.

They're all insignificant moments, but after her mother left to masquerade with love and power; after her father wasted away in the tavern, then the hospital; and after her brother signed up to join the Peacekeepers to escape it all and booked it to District Eight; insignificant moments became all she had left.

She has so many insignificant moments of Dirk Tautson. The way his mouth quirked in the days when he used to smile. The way he exhales, slow and steady, when the needle bites into the crook of his elbow. The way his paintbrush scratches against the canvas when it's drying and out of paint. The way he says her name in a monotone voice, but she hears wind chimes and doorbells crescendoing in the flat, empty syllables. The way her heart aches for him. The way she hates him. The way she hates him more than anyone she's ever hated, more than her mother, more than her father, more than her brother, more than the Capitol itself. She hates him because he made her love him, and then he destroyed himself. And in destroying himself, he destroyed her.

* * *

"Ibby," Dirk says, empty, jaw slack.

She can't move from her chair. She can't do anything. The tears crowd her eyes but she won't let them fall. She knows she should be angry, she should be ashamed, she should hold her head high and march right out of that damn hallway, but she can't. She can't move.

"Ibby, are you okay?" Dirk asks tenderly.

"You make me want to love, hate, cry, take every part of you," Ibiza mutters, her voice breathy and mulled by her shock. Her voice takes on an edge as she starts to feel, as she starts to come back. "Where were you, Dirk?"

A woman totters around the corner, dressed in a sleek tan dress, holding a small gray case marked with a red first aid sign. Her stomach protrudes a bit, which is strange, because her arms, face, and legs are that of a thin, athletic person. She walks to Dirk's side and places her hand on my shoulder.

"Who's this?" Ibiza stutters out.

"My nurse, Yasmine," Dirk chuckles hollowly. "She's been helping me."

Yasmine opens her mouth to speak, but Dirk looks deeply into her eyes.

"What's wrong, baby?" Yasmine asks Dirk, holding his other hand and squeezing it. Ibiza sees the engagement ring glittering under the fluorescent light strips and her eyes squint a little to peer at it. Something seems off. Terribly off. What's wrong with this man?

One look into Dirk's eyes says it all:

 _I'm sorry, Ibiza. You were the one who wasn't there._

Insignificant moments. It's all she has left.

* * *

 **A/N: Wow. I loved this. I think this might be the best chapter of the story yet?**

 **It might seem like this is nearing it's close, but we still have several songs to go, so don't think this is the end. Please review, it's very helpful to hear what you guys think! :D**

 **Until Next Time,**

 **Tracee**


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